Pablo Escobar Novela Coming to Telemundo and US in 2012

By David Salazar (staff@latinospost.com) | First Posted: Jun 11, 2012 08:55 PM EDT

Telenovela 'Pablo Escobar: The Boss of Evil' will be seen by American audiences at the end of year, according to U.S. Network Telemundo.

The soap opera tells the story of the infamous drug lord who was involved in more than 5,000 deaths before he was gunned down on a Medellin rooftop. The telenovela has been airing since May 28 on Colombia's Caracol network.

The narco-novela, which often glamorizes the lives of fictional cartels and drug lords, is currently the most popular genre of telenovela in Colombia. However, according to the Miami Herald, the Pablo Escobar biopic was written and produced by victims of Escobar's violence. Juana Uribe, Caracol's vice president for programming, wrote and produced the series. Her mother, reporter Maruja Pachón, was kidnapped by Escobar and later told her story to Nobel Laureate Gabriel García Márquez. Marquez in turn used the story in News of a Kidnapping. Uribe's uncle Luis Carlos Galán, was murdered by the cartel. Uribe's co-producer Camilo Cano was 20 years old when Escobar's henchmen killed his father, the director of El Espectador newspaper. His father wrote anti-Escobar articles which eventually drew drug lord's attention. He had Cano was killed just days before Christmas in 1986, when his car was strapped with an explosive.

The show will emphasize Escobar's sociopathic qualities that include his murder of 110 people on an Avianca airliner in hopes of killing presidential candidate Cesar Gaviria. Gaviria had missed the plane.

The show is based on the book La Parabola de Pablo by Alonso Salazar and traces Escobar's rise from small-time thug and cigarette trafficker to becoming one of the richest and most powerful men in South American. The story relates Escobar winning a seat in the Colombian Congress and even his infamous offer to pay off Colombia's foreign debt to avoid extradition to the United States. The book also related Escobar's good deeds, such as his building thousands of homes for Medellín's poor.

Escobar is thought to have been involved in over 5,000 murders.

UPDATE: The Telenovela Premieres July 9 at 10 PM on Telemundo.

To watch episodes, click below:

Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 4

Episode 5

Episode 6

Episode 7

Episode 8

Episode 9